Rich Reichert paced a subterranean hallway lined with football players at St. Anthony’s High School, his face radiating intensity as he spouted words full of fire.

The 61-year-old football coach is known for emotional pregame speeches, and this one was no different. He delivered it on homecoming night, Oct. 25, at the South Huntington parochial school moments before facing Chaminade High School, arch rivals from Mineola.

“Sacrifice for each other,” Reichert demanded as an MSG Varsity cameraman followed his every move. “I am old enough to be every one of your fathers. But tonight I’m asking you to be my brother.”

With one last team hurrah, about 80 shoulder-pad-clad teenagers sprang to their feet in one motion and charged toward a stadium overflowing with 6,000 screaming fans. When the game ended, the St. Anthony’s Friars — who finished the season with 11 wins and one loss, and was the No. 1 team in Newsday’s Long Island Large Schools football poll — handed defending Catholic league champion Chaminade a 38-10 defeat.

Reichert’s impassioned address had set the tone, but his words were significant for another reason. At a school run by Franciscan brothers, where academics come first, St. Anthony’s has also earned a reputation as a sports powerhouse. And leading the way is a collection of coaches old enough to be grandfathers.

Reichert teaches physical education and is the youngster of the group. Gene Buonaiuto, 77, owns 381 career wins and led the boys soccer team to the state Catholic High School Athletic Association title last month. And Dave Prutting, 76, has won 418 games with a nationally recognized girls soccer program.

“Being around the kids, it’s kind of infectious,” explained Prutting, of East Northport. “You practice, laugh with them and enjoy life. You start to feel better.”

Old enough to retire
These coaches are of a certain age, a diminishing demographic that spur young athletes from the sidelines of area high schools. Many coaches stop because careers take off or family obligations keep growing. Still others step down once they retire from teaching. And some are forced out of the job.

Not so at St. Anthony’s. It’s an environment where passion is rewarded and longevity prized. Not only do the Friars field a roster of veteran coaches, even junior varsity and freshman coaches are seasoned leaders. That includes Tony Petrilli, 80, from Commack, who is the freshman football coach at St. Anthony’s.

“I just question why I would want to discriminate against a man who has 40-50 years of collective experience,” said Brother Gary Cregan, the school’s principal. “Why would I tell this man he has to retire when he still has a fire within him? Fire is not contingent upon age.”

Varsity coaches Buonaiuto, Prutting and Reichert each set an enviable standard. “They’re still coaching, and frankly at the highest level,” athletic director Don Buckley said. “Traditionally all three varsity teams are among the best in the state.” He added, “I hope these guys are with me a long time.”

These coaches have ushered in a Golden Age of sports in South Huntington, and their longevity is uncommon, even to those very familiar with high school sports on Long Island.

“I’m surprised to hear they have coaches that age,” said Ed Cinelli, executive director of Section XI, the governing body of Suffolk high school sports. “Good for them. They still have that energy and enthusiasm to coach youngsters — that’s unique.”

The atmosphere is decidedly different around these coaches who have toiled for decades, building something meaningful so close to home. The word Buonaiuto, Prutting and Reichert invoke again and again is “family.”

That’s what drew Joe Minucci, a 1999 St. Anthony’s graduate, back to his alma mater. He returned to teach and coach football alongside his mentor. He serves as Reichert’s defensive coordinator and marvels at the work ethic of the head coach.

“A high-school coach is unique,” Minucci said. “There’s an obvious passion for kids and passion for the sport. It’s about being a mentor.”

Family is what pulled Buonaiuto, of Smithtown, into coaching. He caught the bug at Christ the King in Commack. Buonaiuto directed Catholic Youth Organization track, football and soccer teams there before moving on to the Long Island Junior Soccer League.

“My son Steven was in third grade,” Buonaiuto said. “He happened to have a great knack for scoring. That’s how I started coaching. I delved into it.” He began volunteering at St. Anthony’s in 1977, when his eldest son became a Friar. He was handed the varsity job in 1985 and has been at it ever since. It became such an obsession, Buonaiuto took vacation time during soccer season and switched shifts with co-workers — anything to spend more time on the field.

It also proved an important mental break. Buonaiuto spent 36 years as a New York City firefighter, mostly based in Queens. He was a pump driver in an era before GPS technology was available. Navigating cramped Jamaica streets, finding a quick route to the emergency call and getting a hydrant open and water flowing created their own stress.

Less stress than firefighting
“It really was life-and-death situations,” he recalled. “You had to know where you’re going. It was stressful. Someone yelling from the stands, that’s not stress. Coaching is not stress.”

Like all head coaches at the school, Buonaiuto has an excellent support system. Co-coach Don Corrao does much of the heavy lifting. And Reichert has an army of assistants, most of whom are experienced volunteers, capable of being head coaches elsewhere.

Prutting also coached to be close to family — his oldest daughter. He was a volunteer assistant for the L.I. Junior Soccer League’s Northport Seahawks, 10-and-under girls soccer team in the late 1970s when the coach died in a motorcycle accident.

That tragic event thrust Prutting into the role of head coach for the next decade. A medical lab technologist who worked the night shift at Stony Brook University, Prutting was 50 when he coached his first girl’s soccer game at St. Anthony’s.

Now he’s one of the biggest names in the game. Soccer defines him, but he’s decided that after winning 20 Catholic state titles in 26 years, the 2014 season will likely be his last. Prutting said it’s time to hand the reins over to someone else for the good of the program. As for Buonaiuto and Reichert, they have no timetable to leave the games they love.

“Dynasties are not as important as having the right people with the right kids,” Cregan, the school’s principal, said. “That’s my focus. And that’s why these men are so valuable and so important to me. Certainly it’s nice to have a dynasty, but that’s not what makes a good coach great. A good-coach-turned-great is one who can inspire kids with permanent and lifetime memories and permanent and lifetime lessons.”

Winningest coach
Reichert, of Nesconset, was a Nassau County police officer for 25 years before he began teaching at the school. When he was honored during the 2012 season in October for winning more games than any football coach in Suffolk County history (currently, 230 wins and counting), former players returned en masse, and Reichert greeted them all with his 2-year-old grandson in tow.

A long reception line formed on the field afterward, with players who learned under Reichert through the decades eager to reconnect. It was a measure of one coach’s worth that moved beyond wins and losses. “With all the life lessons you learn with football,” said Alvin Alcera, a co-captain on Reichert’s first team in 1987, “you have to pay tribute to the man that actually gave you those lessons.”

Other lessons are more subtle. After superstorm Sandy blew through a year ago, the school’s scoreboard needed fixing. Petrilli, who is the senior statesman among coaches, proved utility-knife useful. An electrician by trade, he identified the issue, then climbed a ladder and made the necessary repair.

Petrilli, who led the freshman team to a 6-2 record this fall, was a Pop Warner youth football coach in New York City in his 20s before putting the sport on hold for more than 30 years. He raised two girls and enjoyed a successful career before picking up coaching again, joining, St. Anthony’s in 1989.

He has no plans to slow down anytime soon. “I’m going to go as long as I can — 90, I guess,” Petrilli said. “If you enjoy it, keep doing it.”

Farmingdale Patch’s coverage of the PGA Tour’s Barclays Tournament at Bethpage State Park last August was honored. Regional Editor Jason Molinet and Editors Joe Dowd and Geoffrey Walter took home first place in the Narrative Sports News category for their week-long reporting at Barclays while Molinet and Walter earned first place in Sports Photograph for their golf coverage.

“Joe Dowd, Geoffrey Walter and Jason Molinet are great reporters and editors, and the Patch family is proud of them,” said David Reich-Hale, associate editorial director for Patch.com’s Connecticut and New York operations.

Sachem Patch and former Editor Chris Vaccaro earned second place in the Social Media category Best Use of Facebook.

Title: From Honor Guard to Grand Marshal; Mayor George Doll once served in honor guard at Arlington National Cemetery. He brought pomp and ceremony Monday to Northport Memorial Day parade.Publication:www.Northport.Patch.comAuthor: Jason MolinetDate: May 28, 2012Word Count: 468

Before he was mayor of Northport, before he was a lobsterman, George Doll served in the honor guard at Arlington National Cemetery.

Just a lanky kid from the Long Island suburbs, Doll landed the prestigious duty in 1965, just as the war in Vietnam started to intensify. Doll was drafted and served 18 months with the 3rd Infantry Division guarding Washington.

So Northport picked the right Grand Marshal for Monday’s Memorial Day Parade.

“Down there it’s real serious,” Doll recalled of his stint at Arlington, home of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. “The day before Memorial Day, the whole army goes out and puts a flag on every one of those graves.”

Doll was a member of the Army drill team in his youth, in part because of his height. As he led the parade down Main Street on Monday – astride a white-haired draft horse and representing the American Legion – Doll appeared downright imposing.

He takes his current role deadly serious.

“Even though I didn’t serve in combat, I was very close to people who did,” Doll said. “My platoon leader, Lt. [Micahel Eugene] Kraft, was sent to Vietnam. He was killed within [three months]. He came back and we had the detail to bury him.”

Kraft was killed in action in the An Lao Valley on April 8, 1967. He was interred at Arlington.

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Doll’s tie, featuring Texas state flag, is a tribute to another fallen comrade. It was a gift from a buddy who died in Vietnam.

“This is not part of the American Legion uniform,” Doll said of the tie. “One of my friends in the service gave me this before he got killed in Vietnam. So I wear this on Memorial Day.”

Doll has been part of the Northport parade since he was a child watching the procession march by.

There was a time – before Doll – when the annual Memorial Day ceremony paraded down an unpaved Main Street. Through the decades, it’s an event that binds the Village and one generation to another.

“The parade always has the right touch,” Doll said. “A lot of Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Legionnaires. We are very receptive to the flag display put on by the Rotary Club. If you are doing something patriotic, you have a good chance getting it OK’d.”

The formal pomp of the day struck the proper red, white and blue chord.

Maybe some future mayor of Northport watched Monday’s ceremony in awe sitting on the street curb – or a stroller – as Doll rode past.

It was an inspiring morning. The dead were honored. Our living war heroes were saluted. It was a day where you were proud to live in Northport.

About this column: Regional Editor Jason Molinet weighs in on the people and issues which make Long Island great.

You know Tom Langan. He’s the guy with an infectious smile, clip board in hand and numbers at his fingertips, navigating the pulsing sideline at St. Anthony’s football games as he keeps pace with what’s happening on the field.

He’s the team statistician, a volunteer job he’s done going back to two decades. And while Langan, 57, has missed games through the years, he has been as much a fixture in the Black and Gold as coach Rich Reichert himself. In fact, the two are cousins.

“I try to tell the kids, ‘You have so many dedicated people here you don’t really realize they are doing things for you behind the scenes,’” Reichert said. “This is really important to him. And he does a really good job for us.”

St. Anthony’s (10-0) plays Iona Prep (8-2) in the CHSFL Class AAA championship game Saturday at 4 p.m. at Mitchel Athletic Complex in Uniondale. It’s no surprise Langan will be there doing his duties for the Friars.

The remarkable part is that Langan is here at all.

The same day St. Anthony’s beat Iona Prep on Oct. 9, 2009, Langan’s left leg was amputated above the knee. It was the result of a freak infection gone wrong and a previously undiagnosed condition.

Reichert gave his cousin the game ball in the hospital. He stopped in every night after practice. And he’s been there for Langan ever since, through a long and evolving rehabilitation process.

His big step forward came during the home opener in September against Holy Cross. Langan made his return to the St. Anthony’s sideline, albeit with his clip board balanced on a walker.

“Tom was there all the time. And we counted on him all the time,” St. Anthony’s athletic director Don Buckley said. “So when he was out last season, it was obvious. Everyone was saying, ‘Where’s Tom?’”

Langan, who is still adjusting to using his titanium prosthesis, recently transferred from a rehab facility in Long Beach to an assisted living home in Medford. Each day is another closer to normalcy.

“I can get around,” said Langan, who is on disability after a career spent in retail. “I use the walker and I’m training with the cane right now. My goal is to walk without anything. It may take two years, but I’m going to do it.”

Today Langan’s life is packed away, boxed up in Reichert’s garage. He was an only child and never married. The football program is his family. Langan finds deeper meaning in everything now, especially on the sideline of a football game. It’s one small but significant step in the rehabilitation process.

“People say, ‘It’s a shame what happened to you,” Langan said. “I say, ‘It happened.’ You have to do your best to adjust. You do the best you can to get your life back.”

It’s not the first time. When Langan’s father died in 1964 – when Langan was all of 10 – Reichert’s dad took on the role of surrogate father figure. So the cousins spent a lot of time together and grew as close as brothers.

This is Reichert’s 24th season at the helm of the St. Anthony’s football program. Langan joined him on the sideline starting in 1991.

The closest he had been to a sports venue was as a vendor at Yankee Stadium growing up in the Bronx. But Langan took instantly to his statistician duties.

There were unexpected benefits. The winning was addictive. Being close to his cousin was great. He forged lasting relationships with the coaching staff. And the positive energy flowing from the teenaged players energized him.

“It keeps me young being around the teenagers,” Langan said. “The coaches treat me great. It’s like I’m part of the staff. I feel like I’m part of the St. Anthony’s family.”

That family has seen him though an ordeal.

When Langan discovered a pebble embedded in his left foot, he removed it with tweezers. It drew a little blood. He bandaged it up and didn’t think twice about it. That was August 2009.

But the wound became infected. Langan ignored it, expecting it would get better. Then the infection spread to the bone. Next thing Langan knew he was unable to get out of bed. He called his cousin.

“As soon as I saw his leg I knew he was in trouble,” said Reichert, a former Nassau County Police officer. “He almost died that night. It was really bad. Gangrene.”

Reichert rushed his cousin to St. Catherine of Siena Medical Center in Smithtown. Langan was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, which only exacerbated the injury. And his leg would have to go. Surgery was scheduled just 24 hours later.

“When you wake up you see what’s not there any more,” Langan said, “it’s a shock.”

All that seems like a lifetime ago. Langan has been to five games this season. He was on the sideline when Reichert won his 200th game last week. The title game will make six. He has a job to do.

“This gives me an incentive to do something,” Langan said. “It gets me outdoors. I’m seeing people again. I’m more determined. You have to push yourself to do it.”

Sometimes it’s easy to overlook the courage of the everyday.

“He’s a true inspiration,” Buckley said. “He’s done so well with his rehab, most of the kids don’t even realize there’s anything wrong. He doesn’t draw attention to himself. He’s a guy behind the scenes.”

On the same turf where athletes push themselves to the limit for the glory of sport, so is the humble stat guy. He’s simply learning to stand tall and walk once more.

Patch.com regional editor Jason Molinet took part in a panel on sports reporting in the Newsday auditorium. The event was sponsored by the Press Club of Long Island. Panelists included Mark Herrmann, Newsday sports writer; Amy McGorry; News 12 Westchester; and Jason Molinet, Patch.com / longtime sports writer. The moderator was Pat Calabria of Farmingdale State College and a former Newsday sports writer.

There’s little doubt that the Catholic football league is the toughest and most talent-rich in New York state. There’s also no contesting that one school sits atop the heap.

St. Anthony’s High School in South Huntington is a Long Island football dynasty with all the trappings of royalty. Coach Rich Reichert has one of the biggest and most experienced staffs you’ll find on a high school field. The 80-man roster is as deep as any college program’s. And the Friars play on a lighted, turf field before packed crowds approaching 2,500, and with TV and radio crews regularly stalking the sidelines.

Little wonder the Friars, despite graduating several key players from last season’s 10-1 CHSFL Class AAA championship, are the top seed and favorites once again. Success breeds success.

Behind the play of QB Tom Schreiber, the Friars won eight games in a row to end the 2009 season. He engineered a pair of fourth-quarter touchdown drives to lift St. Anthony’s past previously unbeaten Holy Trinity, 28-21, in the title game. It marked the eighth league championship in the last nine seasons.

How will the 2010 CHSFL season play out? Holy Trinity, Chaminade and Holy Cross will vie for the title while the Friars break in a new QB. Regardless, the path to the championship still runs through South Huntington and St. Anthony’s. That because Reichert doesn’t rebuild, he reloads. Here’s a look at the CHSFL:

Team Watch

St. Anthony’s: The Friars will look to reach the CHSFL Class AAA title game for the 12th straight season with a new QB but the same unbeatable attitude. The difference maker for the Friars is up front, where their defensive and offensive linemen play on one side of the ball and have the heft to dominate.

Holy Trinity: Can the Titans fill the void left by the graduation of all-everything RB / LB Anthony Brunetti? The four-year star served as the sparkplug for Holy Trinity’s run to the CHSFL Class AAA title game a year ago. If Holy Trinity lets QB Chris Laviano air it out, then look out.

Chaminade: The 2009 season ended with Holy Trinity returning a blocked field goal for a touchdown with 18 seconds left in a 28-24 playoff loss. You can bet second-year coach Stephen Boyd, a former Pro Bowl linebacker, will have the Flyers playing inspired defense. Chaminade will be in every game.

Holy Cross: A semifinalist a year ago, Knights have top wideout Devon Cajuste (921 yards, 7 TDs) back. Holy Cross gave St. Anthony’s a scare in the regular season but bowed out with an injury-riddled lineup in a 28-7 playoff loss to the Friars. This cast will be motivated for more.

Mount St. Michael: Thanks to a No. 9 seed and easy schedule, look for the Mountaineers to play their way into the Top 8 and a spot in the CHSFL Class AAA playoffs. Veteran coach Mario Valentini gets his team to play and Mount finished strong in 2009 with a AA title. Multitalented QB Jaylen Amaker leads the offense. Think sleeper.

Player Watch

Devon Cajuste, Holy Cross, WR: The 6-4, 211-pound senior was unstoppable a year ago as an NYSSWA first-team All-State pick. He led the CHSFL in receiving with 921 yards and 7 TDs on 40 catches, good for 23 yards a reception. Committed to Stanford.

Isaiah Kearney, Xaverian, RB: After a standout freshman year in which he averaged 8.2 yards per carry and rushed for 774 yards and 6 TDs, all of Brooklyn is buzzing over Kearney. The sophomore back is sprinter fast and a true game breaker.

Chris Laviano, Holy Trinity, QB: MaxPreps calls him a Top 100 recruit. This 6-1, 180-pound sophomore will be the focal point now that 2,000-yard rusher Anthony Brunetti is gone. He threw for 1,122 yards and 8 TDs in 2009. He’s got a big arm and a heady sense of the game. Poised for a breakout year.

Tyler McLees, St. Anthony’s, LB: The 6-0, 210-pound senior led the league with 121 tackles a year ago and added 4 sacks. The son of former Carey coach Matt McLees (himself a linebacker at Southern Connecticut), he’ll be a leader on defense.

Charlie Raffa, St. Anthony’s, QB: An Under Amour All-American in lacrosse, the 5-10, 185-pound Raffa has great instincts. And like his predecessors, he can beat you with his arm or legs. Committed to Maryland for lacrosse.

Game Watch

Farrell at Kellenberg, Sept. 18: This is as important a game as Kellenberg will play all season. If the No. 11 Firebirds hope to qualify for the CHSFL Class AAA playoffs, then a win against No. 8 Farrell is a good place to start.

Holy Cross at Holy Trinity, Oct. 16: Holy smokes! A pair of CHSFL Class AAA semifinalists from a year ago collide. Buckle up. This one should be fun to watch.

Chaminade at Holy Trinity, Oct. 9: These Nassau rivals have met in the playoffs two of the last three seasons. It’s always close and heated. The winner of this game could be in the driver’s seat for a home playoff game.

St. Anthony’s at Chaminade, Oct. 16: This rivalry defines the two schools. While Chaminade hasn’t been a factor of late, there’s no one the Friars would rather beat. But it’s the middle of a tough stretch in the schedule for St. Anthony’s. Expect a physical and emotional game.

St. Anthony’s at Holy Trinity, Oct. 23: A rematch of the 2009 CHSFL Class AAA title game. St. Anthony’s has ripped the Titans in recent seasons (outscoring them 201-62 since 2005), bringing Holy Trinity back to Earth after sky-high expectations. This one will be for playoff seeding.

Anyone who knew Howie Vogts understands this wasn’t the way the iconic football coach was supposed to pass on. Not in a hospital bed with an IV tube, heart monitor and respirator hooked up to him, as he did on Saturday at the age of 80 at Mercy Medical Center in Rockville Centre.

No, after 56 years and a New York state-record 364 wins – all at Bethpage High School – it would have only been fitting if the giant of Long Island high school football expired during a game on the sideline. That’s how he would have wanted it, anyway.

I spent enough time with him over the years to know that much. He was a man who could have long ago taken his pension and retired to Florida with his longtime partner, Marilyn Murphy. And he did.

But each August Murph and Howie would drive up I-95 in the comfort of their Lincoln Town Car and return to their Bethpage house in time for the start of football practice. Because Howie Vogts’ real home was the sideline next to his boys.

“It’s the most fruitful thing working and helping young people,” Vogts once told me. “And each year you have a new group to work with.”

Vogts never had children. Yet after 56 years of coaching football in this working-class Nassau town, an entire community looked at the coach with fatherly respect.

A former Golden Eagles player, Erwin Dill, has served as the associate head coach to take the load off Vogts. Dill has manned the sideline for more than a decade while Vogts, in declining health, sat on the bench. It might have made for an awkward relationship if not for the selflessness of the staff.

It was an arrangement an entire town embraced. People get pushed aside in life. You probably know someone who was shown the door before they were ready to leave, at work or elsewhere. People get old. They become expendable.

Not Vogts. He was treasured – and rightly so.

“It’s Coach’s team,” Rich Solliday, a Bethpage resident whose son was an All-Long Island player in the 1990s, once told me. “Howie started the program and he should stay here to the day he dies.”

Thank goodness, he did.

Vogts, a Sewanhaka and Adelphi graduate, started with a freshman team in 1952 and then christened the varsity one year later. He spent one season as an assistant coach at Michigan State in 1966, but returned to the Bethpage sideline next fall. That’s where he’s been ever since.

This was a Grumman town. The Lunar lander was built in Bethpage. Aerospace was the life blood of the community. But the jobs left long ago. The other source of town pride? Football, of course.

Bethpage won 35 regular-season league or conference crowns, 16 playoff titles and five Long Island championships. Vogts was the mastermind behind them all. Even in his later years, he would spend much of his weekdays sequestered in the film room breaking down the opposition. He had a keen football mind to the end.

The death certificate will note Vogts died of congestive heart failure. But anyone who knows him will tell you no one had a bigger heart. How else do you explain a lifetime of devotion to one town and his boys?

Note: Visiting Tuesday and Wednesday 2-5 and 7-9:30 p.m. at the Arthur F. White Funeral Home, 234 Broadway, Bethpage, NY 11714. A Memorial gathering will take place Thursday 11 a.m. at the Howard C. Vogts Football Field at Bethpage High School. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Bethpage Football Dad’s Club. Bethpage High School, Stewart Avene, Bethpage, NY, 11714, in Care of the Bethpage Dad’s Club.

BUFFALO—The stands at Canisius College had already cleared out. Hell, his entire team was long gone too. Hicksville High School rising senior Brandon Gamblin didn’t notice. He was locked in a duel with his own demons and an empty cage.

It was nearly 10 p.m. on Friday night, a half hour after one of the more physically and emotionally draining games of lacrosse Gamblin had ever played. A midfielder on the scholastic boys lacrosse team representing Long Island at the Empire State Games in Buffalo, favorite Long Island had just suffered a heartbreaking loss to the Central region.

The 8-7 defeat in sudden death overtime fell squarely on an offense which hardly possessed the ball in the first quarter and failed to score in the first 22:53 of the game. Sure, Gamblin did his part. He broke the ice with a powerful blast of a goal early in the third quarter to make it 5-1 and restore some much needed confidence.

But his shot was stopped by Central goalie Tyler White time and again in the second half. That’s why Gamblin stayed behind on a shadowy turf field bathed in the soft glow of the light towers, taking shot after shot at an empty cage.

“I was angry,” Gamblin said. “I felt we shouldn’t have lost that game.”

There’s no arguing with the result. Gamblin, a UMass commitment, played with a vengeance the rest of the way. After pouring in six goals to down New York City on Saturday, Gamblin proved just as unstoppable in the gold medal game on Sunday. He scored four times as Long Island (5-1) erased a 4-2 halftime deficit to beat previously unbeaten Central, 7-6. With the win, Long Island became the first region to earn gold in five straight Empire State Games since boys lacrosse became a sport in 1984.

The Kyle Keenan-to-Gamblin connection was so fluid, you’d think they had been teammates for longer than one month. In the end, the relationships the Long Island scholastic boys lacrosse team built—starting with tryouts in June and continuing with 12 exhibition games in Maryland, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania – ended with a gold medal performance at the Empire State Games on Sunday in Buffalo.

“That was just unreal,” West Islip rising senior midfielder Michael Sagl said. “They were just finding each other. Keenan is a great feeder. Gamblin is a great shooter. They were finally able to hook up and it was just fun to watch.”

Keenan, an X attack, directed the offense with precision throughout the four-day tournament. That he had an uncanny ability to find fellow Smithtown West teammate James Pannell for open shots was no surprise. That he hooked up with Gamblin again and again spoke volumes of how well this team of all-stars meshed.

Keenan fed Gamblin for three of his four goals on Sunday.

“It’s not like I was looking for him. He was just open,” said Keenan, a Duke recruit. “He’s got a nose for the goal. He wants to score whenever he’s on the field. That’s his personality.”

It wouldn’t have been possible without the stellar play of Connetquot goalie Zach Oliveri (10 saves), who was in every respect the defensive stopper of the tournament. FOGO Jake Froccaro, a Port Washington junior, also played an important role after missing a game with a mild concussion suffered against Central.

Even Oliveri couldn’t stop Central the entire time. Long Island was victimized for goals twice in the final 1:14 of the first half when Ithaca’s Riley Lasda spun off his defender and broke free in the box. His score was followed by Tom Grimm’s quick strike to make it 4-2 Central with 43 seconds left. Grimm, a Syracuse commitment from Carthage, had the game-winner against Long Island on Friday.

The third quarter belonged to Long Island the entire tournament. This game was no exception. Pannell scored 1:39 into the third, and after pelting the Central goal with a barrage of shots, Garden City’s Tom Gordon scored the equalizer on a feed from Keenan with 4:01 left in the third. Gamblin juked past his defender and fired home the go-ahead goal to make it 5-3 with 1:37 left.

Long Island kept up the pressure from there. Keenan found Gamblin charging toward the net and the Hicksville scorer did the rest to extend the lead to 6-4 with 10:52 to go.

Fayetteville-Manlius attack Ari Waffle scooped in the rebound past Oliveri to make it 6-5 with 7:40 left.

But the Keenan-to-Gamblin connection struck once more to keep Central at arm’s length. Gamblin scored his 18th goal in six-game tournament – and fourth of the day – with 6:52 left.

“It was all a mindset game,” Gamblin said. “We needed to start playing smart, take smart opportunities.”

Jamesville-Dewitt’s Alex Hatem scored his second goal of the day on a diving play at the net close the gap to 7-6 with 4:20 left.

Long Island’s defense kept Central off balance from there. And after Central’s Austin Curtis received a one-minute penalty for slashing, Keenan and Sachem North’s Michael Andreassi held the ball and ran out the clock. All there was left to do was celebrate.

As the son of two coaches, Kyle Keenan emerged from the womb with the DNA of an athlete and the mentoring to make it happen. The rising senior at Smithtown West High School is considered one of the nation’s top boys lacrosse players.

It comes as little wonder considering his father, Sean Keenan, is the Smithtown West boys lacrosse coach. He played for Long Island legend Joe Cuozzo at Ward Melville and was an All-American at Adelphi University.

“He put a stick in my hand when I was 2 years old,” Kyle Keenan said. “We were always having a catch before dinner. He taught me to love lacrosse.”

The 5-11, 160-pound attack capped this third varsity season with a Long Island-best 53 assists in the regular season and a run to the Suffolk Class A semifinals. He committed last fall to reigning national champion Duke.

And yet Keenan has another sports destiny just as deeply embedded.

Bridget Keenan played for the Long Island open women’s soccer team at the 1992 Empire State Games in Albany. Twelve years after her first Empire experience, the ‘92 Games marked her final trip as a player. Unknown to her at the time, Keenan – an Adelphi grad who met her husband in college – was pregnant with her first child.

The Long Island women’s soccer team earned a silver medal that summer. Kyle Keenan was born eight months later. Bridget Keenen coached the open women for three more summers then gave it up to focus on her growing family.

“She was a big soccer player at the Empire State Games and she won a lot of medals,’’ Kyle Keenan said, proud of the family legacy.

All these years later, Kyle Keenan battled through a tryout process unlike anything in high school sports – he was among 712 teenagers to try out for the Long Island scholastic boys lacrosse team – for the right to play at the 2010 Empire State Games.

It was clearly important to him. He had heard the story of his mother playing pregnant at Empires too many times for it not to have an impact. So Keenan arrived early and was third in line to register for tryouts at Bay Shore High School. Yet the first day left him frazzled.

“A lot more kids. The games were short. I wasn’t getting the ball. I didn’t think I was on a good team,’’ Keenan ticked off the issues. “So I didn’t have a great first tryout.”

Even still, Keenan’s ability shone through and he made an impression. He sailed through four rounds of tryouts to earn a spot on the final 20-man roster and fulfill his destiny. Keenan was so anxious, he stayed up past 2 a.m. awaiting the congratulatory email, checking his iPod Touch every few minutes.

He’d chugged up and down the soccer field in his mother’s belly, competing at the Empire State Games. The five-day, Olympic-style festival has been going strong since 1978. Now he’s an Empire player himself, transforming the Games into a multigenerational celebration.

“I’ve heard about Empires since I was a little kid,” Keenan said. “It’s always been a dream of mine to be an Empire player. This is awesome. This is what I’ve wanted since I was a little kid.”

The Long Island scholastic boys lacrosse team has already played nine games to prepare for the Empire State Games, which are in Buffalo from July 21-25. At the Tri-State Tournament in Princeton, N.J. on Saturday, Keenan scored twice against the Dukes – a travel team consisting of the best athletes from the Delaware Valley (Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania) – to help Long Island finish the day 4-0.

The Dukes featured several future Division I players, including fellow Blue Devils commitment Tanner Scott (Conestoga High School, Berwyn, Penn.). Two duo, along with Whitman midfielder Myles Jones, another Duke recruit, shared an embrace and some conversation afterward.

At this elite level, Keenan proved he belonged.

“I go to the cage hard, see the slide and there’s always someone open,’’ said Keenan, who looks to pass first. “That’s my game. It’s instinct.”

Long Island Pulse magazine July 2010 issue featuring Empire of Riches: Long Island lacrosse at the Empire State Games.

Title: Empire of Riches: Long Island lacrosse’s Empire State Games opens doors and as a tradition, is second to nonePublication: Long Island Pulse magazineAuthor: Jason MolinetDate: July 2010Start Page: 42Word Count: 1,059

Max Seibald is one of the most recognizable names in lacrosse.

Just in the last year the 22-year-old midfielder was chosen second overall in the 2009 Major League Lacrosse draft, led Cornell to the NCAA title game and won the Tewaaraton Trophy as the college player of the year.

Yet his rise from unknown high schooler to elite prospect seemingly happened overnight at the Empire State Games, New York’s annual Olympic-style festival. Earning a roster spot on the Long Island scholastic boys’ lacrosse team is a sure ticket to stardom.

Look no further than Seibald, who tried out after a strong junior season at Hewlett High School. But he was among 500 other Long Island hopefuls vying for 20 spots in June 2004. Seibald auditioned the previous summer and was cut the first day. What were the odds a kid with only moderate Division III interest could turn heads and land a job?

“Coming back the next year, it was intimidating,” Seibald said. “You see college coaches on the sidelines. It motivated you but also made you grip the stick a little bit tighter. This was my first experience at this level and I wanted to make things happen.”

Seibald not only made the team, he starred. His roommate on the road that summer? Notre Dame goalie Scott Rodgers, a Wantagh native and MVP of the 2010 NCAA Tournament.

Empires put Seibald on a new trajectory. On the first day college coaches could make contact, the Hewlett teen received an early-morning phone call that woke him up. Then-Princeton coach Bill Tierney was on the other end. The offers came pouring in from there.

That’s the Empire effect.

“It’s been a springboard for kids to get into college,” longtime ESG lacrosse coordinator George Fox said. “There were some kids who have made this team that were surprises. And there were some kids expected to make this team who didn’t.”

Johns Hopkins coach Dave Pietramala agreed. Before he grew into one of the great defensemen in lacrosse history and won two national titles as a coach, Pietramala was an unassuming junior at St. Mary’s High School. Then he earned a spot on the inaugural 1984 Empire State Games squad.

“I wouldn’t be sitting where I am right now if I hadn’t played in the Empires,” said Pietramala, who was recruited to Johns Hopkins as a player only after his ESG performance. “That’s the God’s honest truth. I would have never gone to Johns Hopkins.”

The Empire State Games resumes in Buffalo from July 21-25 after a one-year hiatus forced by recession fears and a state-wide budget crunch. The event draws 7,000 teenaged and adult athletes in 33 sports and has been a summer staple since Gov. Hugh Carey opened the first Games in 1978.

These Games are more cash conscious than ever before. Buffalo area businesses pledged $1.1 million in cash and in-kind support. And for the first time, ESG decided to charge athletes a $10 registration fee.

While some grumble whether the Empire State Games should even move forward at a time when the state threatened to close parks, others are glad to see the Games back. They are a rite of passage, especially in the lacrosse community.

For lacrosse players, the void was filled by the Long Island Showcase Games, an event sponsored by the Nassau and Suffolk coaches associations. As much attention as it garnered for the sport, the Showcase couldn’t replicate the Empire experience.

“I was disappointed. But I was disappointed for Long Island,” Sachem North coach Jay Mauro said. He was a former player and now he’s the Long Island coach. “This is prestigious. It’s great for the kids. We’ve medaled every year. I’m just glad they brought it back this summer.”

That’s why a record 630 players showed up at ESG boys lacrosse tryouts in 2008, and why another 558 registered to compete for a Long Island roster spot by the end of May. And the alumni? A who’s who of lacrosse greats.

Scholastic girls lacrosse, introduced to the Empire State Games in 2001, has medaled each year and won the last three golds. The girls boast the same talent, if not the tradition.

“It’s really the flagship sport,” Fox said. “It means a lot to the kids to make this team. They realize they are representing Long Island. This is the highest level, a select all-star team in an event that’s been important over the years.”

With Fox at the helm, Long Island’s scholastic boys lacrosse team has developed into an elite program with a demanding schedule that’s served to sharpen any rough edges on the assembled talent. Five days of tryouts in each county were followed by a Top 50 game. The final team was announced with fanfare at Hofstra on June 25th.

Then comes the hard part: A month of practice to go with three out-of-state tournaments. All of it serves as a warm-up to the Games themselves—five games in three grueling days in the heat of summer followed by a medal round at Canisius College in Buffalo.

“That is a high-profile sport on Long Island,” Long Island region director Bob Kenney said. “We are the team to beat. And who knows what it would be like if we had an open team?”

True enough. The 2008 Long Island squad drilled Western, 14-3, in the gold medal game. Rocky Point’s Matt Palasek scored five times and West Islip’s Nicky Galasso, the top prospect in the class of 2010, added a goal and three assists.

To the chagrin of the state’s other five regions, the victory locked up Long Island’s fourth straight gold medal and 15th overall. The scholastic boys have medaled every year since the sport’s inception in 1984, a feat on par with the Harlem Globetrotters.

As if playing for a college scholarship or Long Island pride weren’t enough, the 2010 team has a unique opportunity at history.

“We’ve never won five golds in a row,” Fox said.

One way or another, this collection of talent from every corner of Long Island will turn heads. Whether they bring home gold medallion keepsakes, or a scholarship offer or an unforgettable memory, the Empire State Games experience is rich and lasting.